#Also Pulaski doesn't wanna fuck data

[blobaglob]

I read a Reddit post last night talking about how Pulaski gets hate but shes just a woman McCoy. How he was to Spock, she is about Data. I think the main difference is Bones was calling Spock not human, he wasn't trying to be human. But when Pulaski calls Data not human it comes off as meaner to me because Data desperately wants to be human. Also Pulaski doesn't wanna fuck data, bones wants to fuck Spock.

[invisible-brandy]

tng (primarily riker lmao) thoughts (the royale, time squared, the Icarus factor)

im gonna get my thoughts about the royale out of the way first. it felt like a good episode, but it also felt like they could've done more with it. more atmosphere, more... everything. i did enjoy watching data gambling (what a sentence), it's interesting how he puts on this flare, this charming persona. i looove watching the riker-worf-data trio, so even though it felt like it could've been more interesting at times, i still enjoyed it.

now onto time squared & the icarus factor. and riker.

okay, tbf, time squared as an episode is not riker centric, but i dont care. its the episode with the omelette scene and it's so cute. give me more of the crew as family (big polycule) i love this shit. and worf inhaling the omelette while everyone else was put off, that was also adorable. (i wanna see riker make more food for them) dr. pulaski was beginning to feel like an okay character to me, but eh. i don't feel too much of anything for her.

as for the plot, it felt like a good premise, but idk if i like how relatively simple the solution for the time loop was. again, it wasn't bad, i just feel like they could've done more with it.

now, we enter riker's father into the picture.

i think i paused this episode too much tbh just bc it did a very good job at making me angry at riker's father lmao (and i was excited about another piece of klingon lore). whenever any show does a plotline with parent(s) trying to come back into a child's life, i always get pissed if they make the child forgive their parent(s) on the basis of JUST the blood relation and "oh i made mistakes". because it's bullshit. the child in my eyes always has the right to not allow the parent(s) back into their life and to not forgive them, if they don't want to.

in this case, the ending was kinda confusing to me.

it doesn't come off as them trying to show riker forgiving his father, but it doesn't acknowledge that his father is a fucking piece of shit either. it honestly comes off as... eh, well...

they let out some steam. there are no particularly profound revelations, except the fact that kyle cheated in their fights and was never as powerful as will probably assumed him to be. bet this felt both nice and awful. riker ultimately doesn't let his father influence his decision on whether to accept captain position or not. his father decides that he got all he could, and now it's time to go back to his own life. going bye bye again.

leaving, again. because in the end, he doesn't care too much. he just didn't want to let riker potentially accept a more dangerous assignment (and die) without attempting to calm down his own conscience.

(this in itself can be read as such a weird ass manipulative move: was his assignment to the enterprise not dangerous enough? was it just making kyle more jealous/competitive, but this "upgrade" to a captain of a lesser known ship placated him enough to want to reach out?)

that's kinda how i interpreted that.

will doesn't seem to want to completely cut him off; might not be able to, because they work in the same fucking organisation. kyle doesn't actually change, or even attempt to - he doesn't talk about staying in touch or planning any further meetings (and even if it's not very possible on will's new assignment, its— like that's not THE POINT, man still has shore leave and shit doesn't he?), he just tells will to be careful and goes back to his job. because his career and his own life are clearly more important. he maybe loved his wife (or maybe he loved the idea of her) but i dont think he loves his son as he claims. even if he does, who the fuck needs this? i dont think a 30(?) year old riker does.

we don't get to see his reaction to kyle's farewell and exit btw.

pulaski having been in a relationship with kyle doesn't particularly help this whole thing either. i do think she could've mentioned that they knew each other—riker does literally talk about his father in front of her just in the episode before that—but im not too mad she didn't. it is, as riker said, her personal life, so... chances are, if kyle haven't decided to go burying hatchets all of a sudden, the three of them would never end up in the same room.

... okay got that out of my system

(no sorry i just need to say that "i hung in for 13 years, if it wasn't enough then that's just too bad" is a FUCKING INSANE thing to say to your child that you left at 15. look, whatever, you enjoy your career too much to be a father, FINE, i can accept that, classic starfleet guy (although then again WHY did you have the child-but that's rhetorical, people do stupid shit all the time) but just don't come back in there, expecting to be forgiven and praised for the bare minimum you didn't even really do.)

(guys i didn't even like riker until like 1/4 into season 2) okay.

worf's subplot in this episode was very exciting. i love that geordi doesn't hesitate to refer to them as worf's family despite not really wanting to pry into worf's reasons for sulking. i really adore that wes got yelled at by a klingon and went "hmmm no, that's not like him" and then got geordi & data into this, as well as o'brien, pulaski and troi. i didn't particularly enjoy the "all men are kids" conversation because 💀 no. it does draw some parallels between worf & riker though, and i was very glad to see them interact even though quite briefly in this episode.

in conclusion:

me when hating on someone's father